DivKid ochd

Mine broke within four months—inferior build quality. The folks at Instruo were extremely prideful and rude when I initiated the return—making me send many videos over multiple days before they believed it was busted. One of the LFOs wasn't working, and it was an obvious warranty issue, yet they still doubted everything I would say, even after I would prove it in a video—horrible experience. I would advise finding another LFO. I would not recommend Instruo at all. I have had 3 of their modules fail due to poor manufacturing.
Horrible module made by an awful company.

EDITED Jul 6th 2023, 13:43

Hi Humdrum,

first of all I'm sorry to hear that this has been your experience with the module. It's absolutley not what I know others have experienced, it's not how Instruo operate for ochd or in general and this isn't what I'd expect. This isn't to deny your experience but simply to say that's not how things operate normally.

Just speaking generally videos are a really handy way for a company to hear and see what's happening and that can sometimes speed up the process and help diagnose.

Would you like to provide me with further information so I can follow this up with Instruo?

All the best, Ben.

EDITED Jul 6th 2023, 15:49

Thanks for reaching out. The module went defective several months ago, and I have since resolved the issue. I am just getting around to letting the world know about it now.
I was able to prove my module was defective at long last; however, it took so long that I was forced to replace the module with another LFO. I don't normally trust a module after it fails on me, so I sold Ochd.
I certainly don't mind providing videos. I have offered MANY videos to a long list of companies whose gear has failed while under warranty (I have even sent videos of the mute switches Befaco made for you). I am often put into a situation to prove myself to these people. I don't mind sending videos to troubleshoot the issue; however, I do not enjoy when people assume I am lying or just a fool who doesn't know how to use the gear.
Whenever I contact the manufacturers about failed modules, I get the same response, “This isn't the normal experience we see in eurorack”. However, with the high rate of manufacturer defect I have witnessed, it does seem like the typical experience from where I sit. Companies tell me there is a 1% failure rate within the eurorack industry, however, the failure rate in my studio is almost 40%. No lie.....
As for Instruo, the experience has been so bad that when the next Instruo module malfunctioned on me (which was the Scion, and it was still under warranty. In all, I've had three Instruo modules fail on me), I had a friend fix it rather than send it to Instruo. I initially contacted Instruo and sent several videos over the course of a week. He still didn't believe me. Even after I got back to him about how I had it fixed and that it was an issue with the input jack, he still acted like I was lying to him. Not a good way to run a biz. Especially when you charge top dollar for your devices.
My review here is to ensure others know about the low-quality standards of this company. I'd hate to have them find out the same way I did.

Ah, this is ringing some bells. Did we speak a good while back? I remember discussing a lot of misfortune with not just Eurorack but some other gear too.

I understand wanting to move on from gear you've had a bad experiece from, things can certainly feel tainted after bad experiences.

I do think it's important to highlight that this is an extremely rare case both for ochd and for the wider format/industry in terms of failure rates. I know with lots of this piled on you likely won't want to hear this but it's absolutely not in line with anyone elses experience I know.

The failure rate on ochd is well below 1%, I'd have to double check figures but it's into multiple decimal points. Thousands of people are very happy with the module. For gear that I've bought I've experienced similarly very low failure rates all round, very low problems I wouldn't call a failure even too, back from buying my first pieces of gear pre Eurorack, into Eurorack and years later onto now.

Again, none of this is to deny or dispute your experience, just to be clear for everyones benefit.

As for Instruo, I'd be surprised if there wasn't some degree of "lost in translation" at play here. I've collaborated with Jason and the team for many years now and they are always professional and happy to help from my experience and others I've spoken to. However I will be passing this on for the benefit of everyone and to discuss further. Is your username here enough to trace back any contact?

All the best and I hope you have a better experience of music making with your gear ahead.

Yes, we have messaged several times. I have also emailed Jason several times about multiple issues. With Ochd he did replace the module, the other two I just had to walk away from.
There may have been some “loss in translation” with Instruo; however, through the multiple long emails, I believe we cleared everything up and agreed to disagree on his design and level of customer service. I feel he just plain didn't believe me about Scion. While he did offer to fix the module, this would have entailed me sending it over seas with no assurances of an actual fix. It was cheaper and easier to fix it myself. By the time Larachd broke I was over it and didn't even contact him.
Yes, it is hard for me to stomach your stating a %1 failure rate when I have a 35-40% rate of failure in my cases. I work in a clean and dedicated studio space; all power run-through conditioners and into proffesionally built cases. Maybe I live in a death hole for modules, maybe I'm just unlucky. No matter the reason I feel the general public needs to be warned about the extremely high failure rate I've witness from modern modules. My old dopfer system never had any problems in over a decade. Not sure what's changed.

I have been using Ochd for 3 and a half years (January 2020, thanks to Jason/Signal Sounds), this little guy takes place in 60% of my patches. I use 2 Lfos outputs on average (so do I underuse it? ;) but I sometimes use up to 5 or 6 outs at the same time. A very ‘organic’ module as someone said... I confirm.
Ah, Ochd tells me to pass on to you that he is Batumi’s best friend.

(This was just for a modest reminder of the good reputation he deserves...)

I bought my ochd in 2021, and after unpacking it, I noticed an ugly stain on the encoder button that looks like dirt but couldn't be wiped off.

Schneidersladen offered to replace the ochd, but it seems to me that shipping it across Europe wouldn't justify this first-world problem. Therefore, I decided to keep it. As for its functionality, I've never had any issues. Everything has always worked perfectly, and I use it frequently.

"Companies tell me there is a 1% failure rate within the eurorack industry, however, the failure rate in my studio is almost 40%. No lie....."

If the failure rate in my studio was 40% or anything even remotely close to that, I would look into the possibility that there was an issue with my studio, just saying.....I have a fairly big system, and have turned over a fair number of modules while building it, but off the top of my head I can only recall having to make a video for a manufacturer once. I think the failure rate I've experienced might even be < 1%. This is across two different homes, as I've had to move once after my system was largely built. So if you're having to make videos all the time, that should ring some alarm bells.

Regarding Instruo in particular, I have a few of their modules, so far they've all worked fine. I remember them being slow to put out manuals for some of their stuff in their earlier days, but that's really the only negative thing I can think of to say.

EDITED Jul 8th 2023, 13:02

Yes, it has been ringing some alarm bells for sure, and I have gone through the studio and made sure everything is top notch; that’s why I have written this post.
Sorry to hear about the dirt on your module dude but that feels like gaslighting to me.
As I mentioned before, these modules have all been housed in a clean, dedicated, professional studio with conditioned power and high quality cases. There is a bunch of other gear in there that is just as temperamental as any eurorack module and none of that gear has shown any issues. I have owned a dopfer system since 2005 or so, and it is still running just fine. These failures have occurred across 4 separate cases over the last, 3 years. Nothing changed in the studio except the addition of modern eurorack gear. And the modern eurorack hear is all that has failed.
At this point I have had 3 Instruo devices fail, and the one I fixed myself (Scion) had a faulty input jack. Definitely not my doing... Neither was it my fault when Maleknko Heavy Indusrties put the wrong vactrol in their Dual Borg. Also wasn't my fault when Mosaic gave me a quantizer that was DOA then replaced it with one that had major Firmware issues (At this point I have personally initiated 5 firmware updates). Was it just me getting upset over a “first world problem” when SSF gave me an Autodub module that didn't send audio, or whe when Afterlater audio sent a Steps where the EOB trigger doesn't work. When my Muta Jovis broke after only a few months of use, maybe it was simply because I'm to aggressive at muting stuff; is that the idea?
Just because I come here and state the issues I've had in eurorack doesn't give everyone a right to deny my experience and imply I'm responsible for dozens of failures. The only person that has been engaging to chat with on this form has been DIVKID, the one who designed the module in question.

I apologize for posting in your precious forum. I won't do it again.

EDITED Jul 8th 2023, 15:04

I'm not denying your experience, that wasn't my intention at all. Nor was it my intention to tear you down. I'm not in any way suggesting that you're making anything up. My intention was simply to get you to think about potential issues with your studio and eurorack setup that you might have overlooked. Because a 40% module failure rate is NOT a typical experience. That's quite a lot to just ascribe to random chance. I provided my experience as a reference point, that's all. But thanks for calling me a vampire lol.

If you're going to post things like "Horrible module made by an awful company" on a public message board and then follow that up by saying how 40% of the modules in your system have failed, I don't know why you would expect that other people wouldn't post their relevant experiences with the same company for perspective. If you just wanted to go back and forth with DivKid then you should have DM'd him. The person being precious here is you.

EDITED Jul 8th 2023, 14:44

4 of the 8 outputs of my OCHD are faulty. First it was just 1 of them, but it gets worse over time. Had it for around 2 years.
I have a friend who has the same problem with this OCHD.

I had 3 Instruo modules and 2 of them turned out to be faulty, which is not enough experience of course, but I never had any issue with any other brands, I have a large system, and probably had around 150 modules so far.

It may be worth making a short video of the issues and sending it to Instruo, there email is in their T&Cs info@instruomodular.com

For me as a producer of beer we like to investigate any issues that get reported and react as best we can to resolve problems or indeed in some cases our due dilligence tells us we have done everything correct and the customer is doing something wrong, each case is tracked back to production records and staff consulted so that we can always improve and if needed adjust process to target consistency.
Thankfully problems are vanishingly rare but we still take the time to see if improvements can be made.

Well I don't think you are lying, however, I don't think your problem is the quality of your modules. Something is faulty in your electrical setup.

"the failure rate in my studio is almost 40%. No lie....."

Well this is not normal and it doesnt point to one faulty module but rather a faulty system.

I have had my øchd for two years or so and I just bought two expanders so I need to buy one more øchd.

I have a huge system and many high end modules and I can safely say that the build quality of the øchd is superb and up there with the best of them, and the same should be sayd about Bill Wilson's design, simply a badass modulation source.

Now I don't know what type of transformers you are using or the electricity structure in your facilities, but I would unplug it and have it analyzed by a specialist.

EDITED Jan 24th, 22:17

Now I don't know what type of transformers you are using or the electricity structure in your facilities, but I would unplug it and have it analyzed by a specialist.
-- GunnarWaage

The original Poster has left the building! You might want to scrap all that as it's Yesterday's news Today ;-)

@mattroix was just piggy-backing on this topic with a question.

Well yes he probably understood that his theory was flawed. But no I will leave it standing. Those are small companies making Eurorack modules and their work should not be torn down here on those pages of modulargrid.net without premise.

I think Elvis made the right decision :)

I've had it for one year so far and, 2 weeks after the end of the warranty, one of the outputs doesn't go into negative anymore as if it was rectified.
One week since I wrote to instruo, no reply.
It really looks simple to repair.

[Edit] It turns out it wasn't broken at all. False alarm.

EDITED Mar 14th, 03:58

My Ochd also failed on me too. One of he outputs just stopped working. Luckly it was in the warrenty period, but my experience with instruo was similar to the OP. I actually have a pretty high fail/doa rate of eurorack modules in my history. maybe not 40% but probably 25%. and my power situation is just fine thank you hahaha.
It’s my opinion that if a module is failing this is exactly the place to talk about it. It doesnt matter who the manacturer is. If the gear has issues I’d like to know about it.

EDITED Mar 12th, 21:31

"I actually have a pretty high fail/doa rate of eurorack modules in my history. maybe not 40% but probably 25%. and my power situation is just fine thank you hahaha."

With a 25% of your modules failing there is something seriously wrong with your setup. I have to repeat my view on this. There are plenty of users here who don't know much about modular Synthesis, that's all fine. However when people are frying modules instead of playing them, be it at 25% or 40%, one has to wonder, have you considered the oboe or the Accordion ?

have you considered the oboe or the Accordion ?
-- GunnarWaage
no but i have considered leaving this forum just like the OP did because of rude people such as yourself.